Messa di Gloria

Kyrie

Gloria

Gloria in excelsis Deo –

Et in terra pax –

Laudamus te

Gratias –

Gloria in excelsis Deo –

Domine Deus

Qui tollis –

Quoniam –

Cum Sancto Spiritu - Gloria in excelsis Deo

Credo

Credo in unum Deum –

Et incarnatus est

Crucifixus –

Et resurrexit –

Et in unam sanctam catholicam –

Et exspecto resurrectionem

Sanctus & Benedictus

Sanctus, Dominus Deus –

Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini

Agnus Dei

Puccini’s first professional appointment, when he was still a student at the Istituto Musicale Pacini, was as a church organist in the city of Lucca, where the last four generations of Puccinis had held similar posts. It was not his ambition, however, to follow the family tradition. When, at the age of 18, he walked the twenty miles from Lucca to Pisa and back for a performance of Verdi's Aida – and, as he later recalled, “a musical window opened” for him – he knew that his future would not be in the church but in the opera house. But he still had to complete his studies at the Istituo and it was as a graduation exercise that, incorporating two earlier vocal pieces, he wrote what he called his Messa a quattro voci (Mass in four voices) in 1880. The Mass was not published during the composer’s lifetime and it is clear, from the fact the he drew on its material for other works, that he had no intention to release it. Although the score was never actually lost, it was “rediscovered” in 1951 and published not under Puccini’s own title but, presumably in acknowledgement of its impressively proportioned Gloria, as Messa di Gloria.

The operatic potential of the young composer is clear at many points in the Messa di Gloria. Indeed, even the opening Kyrie, which is written in strict counterpoint in the sacred style, is melodically so attractive that Puccini was able to make use of it nine years later for a prayer episode in his second opera, Edgar. It is interesting too that “Christe eleison” middle section of the Kyrie makes such a dramatic contrast with the “Kyrie eleison” sections on either side.

Variety is a particularly vital element in the Gloria, which takes up not far short of half the length of the whole work. It begins as a lively fugue on “Gloria in excelsis Deo” which, initiated by sopranos and punctuated by stirring brass interventions, gives way to a quietly thoughtful “et in terra pax” and a resplendent “Laudamus te.” The echoes on woodwind of the “Gloria in excelsis Deo” theme have a distinctly operatic feel about them. So does the following, highly expressive Gratias for solo tenor. A joyful recall of “Gloria in excelsis Deo” precedes a gentle “Domine Deus” ending with woodwind writing that anticipates (by twenty years) something of the sound of the last scene of Tosca. Beginning as a prayer for basses, the Qui tollis is roused by trumpet calls into what could almost be a patriotic chorus in a Verdi opera. It leads without a break into an imposing Quoniam which is succeeded in turn, again without a break, by a vigorous Cum Sancto Spirito fugue and a last, spectacular recall of the “Gloria in excelsis Deo.”

Though not quite as long as the Gloria, the Credo also makes maximum use of contrasts in colour, texture, harmony and expression. The unshakably affirmative chorus on “Credo in unum Deum,” sung in solid unison at first, is followed by another expressive tenor solo, Et incarnatus, which develops a positively operatic intensity of passion at one point. The bass soloist makes his first entry with a tragically melodious Crucifixus, the tearful effect of which is dispelled by a superbly dramatic Et resurrexit chorus. There is a similar contrast between the fervent Et in unam sanctam catholicam and the thrill of anticipation in the Exspecto resurrectionem and the short but brilliant fugue on “Et vitam venuri.”

Puccini treats the Sanctus rather more modestly than most composers of the time, perhaps to avoid upstaging his baritone solo version of the Benedictus, which he liked so much that he was to allude to it 13 years later in the minuet in the second act of Manon Lescaut. The Agnus Dei – its charmingly melodious tenor solo, its serene choral interjections, its lyrical duet for tenor and bass – he seems to have liked too. Certainly, he was to incorporate the whole of it in the madrigale in the same act of Manon lescaut. Here, in its original context, it might seem a slender ending to such large-scale construction as the Messa di Gloria but, even so, it is one of the most accomplished movements in an altogether prophetic work.

Gerald Larner 2007